In website monitoring, GET and HEAD are the methods the tool uses to "talk" to your server to see if it is alive.
- GET: The monitor asks for the entire page, including the content (HTML, text, etc.). It is exactly like what happens when a real person visits your site in a browser.
- HEAD: The monitor asks only for the headers (metadata) and tells the server not to send the actual page content. It is faster and uses less bandwidth.
Why it shows "Down" when your site is "Up"
The reason you see "down" incidents while your host says everything is fine is likely due to how your server handles HEAD requests:
- Unsupported Method: Many servers or security plugins (like Wordfence or Cloudflare) are configured to block HEAD requests as a security measure, returning a "405 Method Not Allowed" error.
- False Positive: Even if your site is working perfectly for users (who use GET), the monitor sees that "405" error from the HEAD request and marks the site as "Down".
- Hosting Discrepancy: Your host says the site is up because they are looking at the server's overall health or a standard GET request, while the monitor is failing on a specific technicality.
Should you unselect "HEAD"?
Yes, you should switch the setting to GET.
While HEAD is more efficient, using GET is the "gold standard" for monitoring because it mimics a real visitor. If your monitor uses GET and still shows the site as down, then there is a genuine issue your host needs to address.
Community Perspectives on HEAD vs GET
Expert users often debate which method is better for reliability versus performance.
“HEAD requests are just like GET requests, except the body of the response is empty.”
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